The present invention relates to the Internet and, more particularly, to a method and system for automatically publishing electronic mail messages on the Internet.
Use of the Internet, and more specifically, the World Wide Web, has been gaining in popularity in the last several years. At the present time, almost every large corporation, university, government, organization, and many businesses around the world are connected to and have access to the Internet. Many individuals and households also have access to the Internet through a myriad of Internet Service Providers which provide an entrypoint to the Internet.
The World Wide Web provides the ability for a remote user to essentially share information to hundreds, thousands and even millions of other remote users around the world. Simply by sharing a simple Uniform Resource Locator (URL) or xe2x80x9clinkxe2x80x9d to their Web page, a user can provide text, graphics, pictures, video, sound and other such content to anyone who has access to the World Wide Web. Generally, a Web page is a file on a computer system containing information for display or other presentation to a user. Web pages are typically written in hyper-text markup language (HTML) and contain references to associated text, graphics, and other multimedia files.
However, while most people have some familiarity with accessing Web pages and other Internet based utilities such as electronic mail, actually creating and publishing a Web page is still quite a difficult and complicated task for most individuals. The peculiarities and eccentricities of different server standards, file transfer protocols and procedures, Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) and an ever evolving array of technologies related to the Internet can make the task of creating and publishing a Web page quite onerous and time consuming.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to have a relatively simplistic and intuitive method and system for creating and publishing Web pages whereby a user can avoid having to learn and understand the many protocols and procedures for creating and publishing a Web page.
The present invention provides a system and method for publishing electronic mail messages on the Internet via a designated electronic mail message repository provided in a user""s electronic mail facility. One embodiment of the method of the present invention includes the steps of providing a designated repository for electronic mail messages that a user wants to be published on the Internet, receiving an electronic mail message in the designated repository, processing the electronic mail message into an Internet readable format and then publishing the electronic mail message on the Internet.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the designated repository is an electronic mail message folder. A user selects an electronic mail message and moves the electronic mail message to the designated repository. The electronic mail message is processed by converting the electronic mail message into an Internet readable format such as into an HTML format. The electronic mail message is then published on the Internet and made publicly available.
In an exemplary system of the present invention, the system includes an electronic mail facility, an electronic mail server, an electronic mail message processor and a Web server. The electronic mail facility provides users with capabilities such as sending, receiving and storing electronic mail messages. Through the electronic mail message facility, the user is able to select one or more electronic mail messages that the user wishes to be published on the Internet. The electronic mail message facility preferably includes a designated repository into which the user selected electronic mail message may be placed. This repository may be an actual separate directory or folder or simply a virtual repository into which the electronic mail is placed. Once in this designated repository, the electronic mail message is processed by the electronic mail message processor which converts the electronic mail message into a format suitable for publication on the Internet. The converted electronic mail message is then published on the Internet via the Web server.